Kuniji

Named in honor of Kuniji Saito (1913- ), who joined the Tokyo Astronomical Observatory in 1936 and was engaged mainly in research on the solar corona. Following his retirement in 1974, he has collected historical materials from Japan, China and other countries to analyze them from the viewpoint of modern astronomy, using computers. He named this field of research "paleoastronomy" and hopes that many other reearchers will enter into this kind of research. He also served as president of the Astronomical Society of Japan. (M 32789; M 33151)

Name proposed by the discoverers following a suggestion by A. Fujii and A. Tanno.